I have been enjoying Michael Sporn and Richard O’Connor’s ongoing reprinting the NY Animation Union newsletter, Top Cel. If you haven’t already been leafing through these vital pages, you should really check them out. They are a virtual time capsule of animation history – the equivalent of a professional animators blog in the decades before the internet.

I have a bunch of Fleischer’s in-house magazine (Fleischer’s Animated News) from the mid-thirties… has anyone posted those on the internet yet? If not, I’d be happy to share mine – if there is enough interest.

In the meantime, I have about 40 issues of Schlesinger’s bi-monthly in-house “newspaper”, The Exposure Sheet, which I haven’t seen posted anywhere. These are informal, gossipy little newsletters, prepared by several assistants, inkers and painters in 1939-1940. If one reads them carefully, one can get a good idea of the fun Schlesinger’s employees were having making the original Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies – and glean bits of biographical information, news and minutiae about our favorite artists at the studio.

I won’t summarize all the interesting things you’ll find in this first six-page issue – I’ll leave that for you to discover – but I will point out the nice little “backgrounds” on Bugs Hardaway, Dave Monahan, Ken Harris and John McGrew (among others) – read those!

Wanna see the other 39 issues? Should I make this a regular weekly feature? Let me know in the comments below.

(Click on the thumbnails below to enlarge pages). Enjoy!